No. 15-981 IN THE Supreme Court of the United States LENEUOTI FIAFIA TUAUA, ET AL., Petitioners, v. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, ET AL., Respondents. On Petition for Writ of Certiorari to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit BRIEF IN OPPOSITION BY RESPONDENTS AMERICAN SAMOA GOVERNMENT AND THE OFFICE OF CONGRESSWOMAN AUMUA AMATA OF AMERICAN SAMOA MICHAEL F. WILLIAMS Counsel of Record KATHLEEN A. BROGAN KIRKLAND & ELLIS LLP 655 Fifteenth St., N.W. Washington, DC 20005 (202) 879-5000 [email protected] Counsel for Respondents May 11, 2016 QUESTION PRESENTED Whether the Court of Appeals correctly held, consistent with more than a century of precedent and unbroken historical practice, that the Citizenship Clause of the United States Constitution does not automatically extend birthright citizenship to persons born in the unincorporated territory of American Samoa, over the objections of the elected representatives and government of the people of American Samoa and in violation of the American Samoan people’s right to self-determination. ii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page QUESTION PRESENTED........................................... i TABLE OF CONTENTS ............................................. ii TABLE OF AUTHORITIES ...................................... iii BRIEF FOR RESPONDENTS .................................... 1 STATEMENT .............................................................. 3 A. The United States and Its Territories ........... 3 B. The American Samoan Way of Life ............... 6 C. The Lawsuit .................................................... 8 REASONS FOR DENYING THE PETITION .......... 10 I. The D.C. Circuit’s Ruling Respects Fa’a Samoa and Is the Only Sensible Result. ........... 10 II. The D.C. Circuit’s Ruling Affirms the Political Autonomy and Right to Self- Determination of the People of American Samoa. ................................................................. 18 A. The People of American Samoa Are Entitled to Choose Their Own Political Arrangements. ............................... 18 B. Congress—Not the Courts—Extended Citizenship to Other Territories and Never Over Their Objections. ...................... 22 CONCLUSION .......................................................... 30 iii TABLE OF AUTHORITIES Page(s) CASES Corp. of Presiding Bishop of Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-Day Saints v. Hodel, 830 F.2d 374 (D.C. Cir. 1987) ............................. 13 Hirabayashi v. United States, 320 U.S. 81 (1943) ............................................... 12 Kennett v. Chambers, 55 U.S. (14 How.) 38 (1852) ................................ 18 King v. Andrus, 452 F. Supp. 11 (D.D.C. 1977) ............................ 24 Lee v. Weisman, 505 U.S. 577 (1992) ............................................. 16 Nunez v. City of San Diego, 114 F.3d 935 (9th Cir. 1997) ............................... 16 Qutb v. Strauss, 11 F.3d 488 (5th Cir. 1993) ................................. 17 Ramos v. Town of Vernon, 353 F.3d 171 (2d Cir. 2003) ................................ 16 Schleifer v. City of Charlottesville, 159 F.3d 843 (4th Cir. 1998) ............................... 17 Spencer v. Casavilla, 903 F.2d 171 (2d Cir. 1990) ................................ 16 United States v. Wheeler, 254 U.S. 281 (1920) ............................................. 16 Wabol v. Villacrusis, 958 F.2d 1450 (1990) ........................................... 15 iv CONSTITUTIONAL PROVISIONS Revised Const. of Am. Samoa art. 1 § 1 ...................... 5 Revised Const. of Am. Samoa art. 1 § 2 ...................... 5 Revised Const. of Am. Samoa art. 1 § 3 ...................... 7 Revised Const. of Am. Samoa art. 1 § 5 ...................... 5 Revised Const. of Am. Samoa art. 2, § 3 ................... 12 Revised Const. of Am. Samoa arts. 2-4 ...................... 5 STATUTES 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(29) ............................................... 23 8 U.S.C. § 1406 .................................................... 23, 28 8 U.S.C. § 1407 .................................................... 23, 26 8 U.S.C. § 1408(1) ...................................................... 23 8 U.S.C. § 1421 .................................................... 23, 26 48 U.S.C. § 1421 ........................................................ 26 Act of Mar. 3, 1917, 39 Stat. 1132 ............................ 28 Act of June 22, 1936, 49 Stat. 1807 (1936) (codified at 48 U.S.C. § 1405 (1936) ................... 28 Act of July 22, 1954, 68 Stat. 497 (1954) (codified at 48 U.S.C. § 1541 (1954) ................... 29 Act of March 24, 1976, 90 Stat. 266 .......................... 23 Am. Samoa Code Ann. § 2.1402(d) ........................... 21 Am. Samoa Code Ann. § 37.0204(a) ......................... 13 Am. Samoa Code Ann. § 37.0204(a-b) ...................... 14 Jones-Shafroth Act of 1917, Pub. L. 64-368, 39 Stat. 951 ................................................... 23, 29 v LEGISLATIVE HISTORY H.R. Rep. No. 1677 (1950) ......................................... 27 H.R.J. Res. 549, 94th Cong. (1976) ........................... 26 Civil Government for Porto Rico: Hearings on H.R. 8501 Before the H. Comm. on Insular Affairs, 64th Cong. (1916) ................ 29 Civil Government for Guam: Hearing on S. 185, S. 1892 and H.R. 7273 Before the Subcomm. of the S. Comm. on Interior and Insular Affairs, 81st Cong. 44 (1950) ..................................... 27, 28 Revised Constitution of Am. Samoa: Hearing Before the Subcomm. on Energy Conservation and Supply of the Comm. on Energy and Natural Res., 98th Cong. 46 (1984) ......................... 14, 17, 21, 24 OTHER AUTHORITIES 1 Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (Thomas M. Cooley ed., 4th ed. 1873) ................ 18 Alexander M. Bickel, The Morality of Consent (1975) .......................... 19 Arnold H. Leibowitz, American Samoa: Decline of a Culture, 10 Cal. W. Int’l L.J. 220 (1980) ................. 7, 11, 13 Arnold H. Liebowitz, Defining Status: A Comprehensive Analysis of United States Territorial Relations (1989) ........ 11, 12, 25, 26, 28 Cession of Manu’a Islands, Jul. 16, 1904, U.S.-Manua Samoa, reprinted in Am. vi Samoa Code Ann., Historical Documents and Constitutions (1992) ...................................... 6 Cession of Tutuila and Aunu’u, Apr. 17, 1900, U.S.-Tutuila Samoa, reprinted in Am. Samoa Code Ann., Historical Documents and Constitutions (1992) ...................................... 6 Daniel E. Hall, Curfews, Culture, and Custom in American Samoa: An Analytical Map for Applying the U.S. Constitution to U.S.Territories, 2 Asian-Pac. L. & Pol’y J. 3 (2001) ......... 11, 15, 16 Derek Heater, Citizenship: The Civic Ideal in World History, Politics and Education (3d ed. 2004) ...................................... 19 Ediberto Román & Theron Simmons, Membership Denied: Subordination and Subjugation Under United States Expansionism, 39 San Diego L. Rev. 437 (2002) ........................ 20 Jeffrey B. Teichert, Resisting Temptation in the Garden of Paradise: Preserving the Role of Samoan Custom in the Law of American Samoa, 3 Gonz. J. Int’l L. 35 (2000) ............................ 7, 14 John Adams, Answer of the House, reprinted in The Briefs of The American Revolution (John Philip Reid ed., 1981) ............. 22 Jon M. Van Dyke, The Evolving Legal Relationships Between the United States and Its Affiliated U.S-Flag Islands, 14 U. Haw. L. Rev. 445 (1992) ............................ 29 Lowell D. Holmes, Quest for the Real Samoa: The Mead/Freeman Controversy & Beyond (1987) ................................................................... 11 vii Neil Weinstock Netanel, Cyberspace Self- Governance: A Skeptical View from Liberal Democratic Theory, 88 Calif. L. Rev. 395 (2000) ................................ 19 Report of the United Nations Visiting Mission to the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands (1961) ......................................... 25 Stanley K. Laughlin, Jr., Cultural Preservation in Pacific Islands: Still A Good Idea-and Constitutional, 27 U. Haw. L. Rev. 331 (2005) .............................. 7 Statement by the Representative of American Samoa, Pacific Regional Seminar on the Implementation of the Third International Decade for the Eradication of Colonialism: Current Realities and Prospects (June 1, 2012), available at http://www.un.org/en/decolonization/ pdf/crp_2012_american_samoa.pdf .................... 20 Statement of Jay Kenneth Katzen on American Samoa, U.S. Mission to the United Nations (Nov. 18, 1976) .................................................... 20 Statement of Cong. Eni F.H. Faleomavaega, Before the United Nations Special Committee on Decolonization (May 23, 2001), available at http://www.oocities.org/west_papua/ Faleomavaega.htm ................................................ 4 The Future Political Status Study Commission of American Samoa (2007) ............ 21 W. Ofuatey-Kodjoe, The Principle of Self-Determination in International Law 79 (1977) ...................................................... 20 BRIEF FOR RESPONDENTS This case presents the question of whether the Court should, for the first time in the nation’s history, extend United States citizenship by judicial fiat to residents of an unincorporated territory of the United States. The answer to that question, according to the Court’s precedent and historical practice for more than a century, is plainly “no.” Whenever the United States has extended citizenship to the inhabitants of an unincorporated